politics

WASHINGTON - A dispute between the House and Senate over money for disaster relief is threatening a short-term bill to finance the government after Sept. 30, raising the prospect of a government shutdown.

While a plan to keep the government running well into November was expected to attract far less controversy than the measure that nearly led to a shutdown last spring, Democrats and Republicans have divergent views on how much money should go to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and whether those dollars should be offset by spending cuts elsewhere.

Setting up a showdown with the Senate, the House on Wednesday is set to pass the short-term spending measure, which will include $3.65 billion for disaster aid. The stop-gap bill is needed because Congress has not passed any of the 12 annual spending bills due by Oct. 1.

Of the House aid money, $1 billion is designated for the 2011 fiscal year and would be offset by a $1.5 billion cut to the Department of Energy's Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program. In addition, FEMA would get $2.65 billion in the 2012 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1. House Republicans say they are skeptical of making a larger allocation to the agency for fear it would be wasted.

When that bill makes it to the Senate, Democratic leaders plan to strike the House language on the aid and substitute a bipartisan version passed by the Senate last week that provided the agency with $6.9 billion in the aftermath of Hurricane Irene, with none of the spending offsets that have offended Senate Democrats as much as the lower dollar figure.

"I was disappointed to see that the House shortchanged the Federal Emergency Management Agency," Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., the majority leader, said on Tuesday, "failing to provide the funding to adequately help Americans whose lives have been devastated by floods, hurricanes and tornadoes."

But a top House Republican predicted that if Reid changed the bill, it would most likely fail on the House floor, raising the possibility of a government shutdown, similar to the impasse last spring, but over a single issue rather than many.

Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Va. and the majority leader, said that the House was firm on offsetting the costs of disaster relief for the current fiscal year and that he was confident that the short-term spending bill would pass his chamber, even as some Republicans are making noises about wanting more cuts.

Senate Democrats believe they hold the political advantage on the issue because they could portray House Republicans as shuttering the government because of their insistence on keeping disaster relief from adding to the deficit, a departure from past practice. In addition, 10 Senate Republicans also supported the higher aid figure.